Irritated! That is what can happen to me after having bad flashbacks, I become so irritable about everything! I believe it comes from a resurgence of anger at the rapist whom I cannot take it out on, after all I wouldn’t have flashbacks if he hadn’t touched me. I have now, thankfully, come to the point where I can recognize it for what it is so as to maintain some kind of self-control concerning it when I am around other people. At least until someone. sits. on. that. last. nerve.
I was at work this evening being irritated all to myself; I hate feeling that way and the more I try to talk it away, the more it fights back. I try to “acknowledge it, accept it, and let it pass through.” Huh, Irritability does not like that game, it scoffs at me and gains strength as I get irritated that my coping (un)skills are not working. Alone is good during that time.
Then I get the text that fires off that nerve. My boyfriend wants to know how I am doing. Expensive therapy has taught me to be authentic, and I hate ‘fine’. I am feeling irritable {send} the text goes back. In his usual manner of trying to calm me I get, “Now be nice. [It’ll] be okay.” Little did this poor man know that would be the final in a line of little irritations. I did not want to be calmed or worse yet…sshhhd. My answer, “Don’t patronize me. I am allowed to be frustrated and irritable!” No reply. The unintentional arrow hit.
I called him about fifteen minutes later and, after getting over my shock that he answered, I explained what his words say loud and clear, “Don’t have negative feelings.” I know in his heart he just wants to make everything okay, make me okay. He still struggles himself with the fact that he is my protector and he didn’t (couldn’t) protect me. (side bar: he was 20 miles away) He did apologize when he understood how I heard his words, and he is still happy to be helping me pay for this counseling that is teaching me to allow myself to feel and is giving me a voice to express those feelings.
Praise God for His mercy, and His unfailing Love! I thank God that tomorrow is another day!
The faithful love of the Lord never ends!
His mercies never cease.
Great is his faithfulness;
his mercies begin afresh each morning.
~Lamentations 3:22-23
Amen and Amen!
